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Appendix II Public Views Received during the Rehabilitation Programme Plan Review

Directions of Overall Development

• To promote cross-sectoral/inter-departmental collaboration in providing a barrier-free environment and diversified services for persons with disabilities so as to facilitate their integration into the community.

• To empower persons with disabilities and their carers to turn

them into valuable social capitals. • To formulate effective policies to meet the needs of an ageing

disabled population and the increasing number of persons with psychiatric disabilities.

• To promote rehabilitation services along the line of

whole-person development and whole-person care. • To include scientific research as a strategic focus for preventing

disabilities. Definition of Disability

• As one may have disabilities of various degrees in a number of aspects or different aspects at different stages of life, it is inappropriate to pigeonhole disabilities rigidly. Rehabilitation services should be people-oriented while meeting specific needs of individuals.

• To further explore the feasibility of implementing the

International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF) in Hong Kong.

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• To consider including specific learning difficulties and attention

deficit/hyperactivity disorder in the Hong Kong Rehabilitation Programme Plan.

• Dyslexia should not be classified as a disability because once a

person with dyslexia leaves school, it will no longer have any bearing on his daily life. It serves no purpose to single out and label these people who have already integrated into the community.

• To conduct regular statistical surveys to update the data of

different categories of persons with disabilities with a view to formulating appropriate rehabilitation policies and services.

Prevention and Identification

• To strengthen education to the public on upkeeping of mental health, early identification of mental health problems and the importance of early receipt of treatment.

• To further promote occupational and road safety to reduce

accident-induced disability. • To develop effective measures for disease prevention by

carrying out extensive consultation with persons with disabilities, people with chronic illness and self-help organisations.

• To strengthen trainings on understanding of individual

disabilities and rehabilitation services for front line medical staff in hospitals, government clinics and maternal and child health centres so as to assist persons with disabilities and their family members to receive early and appropriate treatment and services.

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Medical Rehabilitation

• To strengthen the cooperation between Hospital Authority’s various hospital clusters and relevant government departments/rehabilitation agencies in order to achieve better coordination in the provision of healthcare and rehabilitation services in various hospital clusters and enhance communication between both sides.

• To increase training places for nurses to cope with the shortage

of nurses in rehabilitation services. • To provide visiting medical practitioner service to persons with

disabilities in hostels to improve their primary medical care. • To strengthen outreaching psychiatric service provided to

hostels for the persons with intellectual disabilities. • To continue the provision of evening consultation sessions in

respect of psychiatric service so as to ensure that patients’ daytime work will not be affected.

• To conduct review of the current arrangements for patients to

queue up for consultation chips and bookings with a view to improving the queuing system for the benefit of persons with disabilities.

• To strengthen psychiatric manpower and service.

• The Department of Health should step up training for nurses of

maternal and child health centres.

Pre-school Training and Education

• To provide necessary ongoing training for staff engaged in pre-school training service to raise service quality.

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• To keep a close watch on the demand for pre-school training

service, especially in newly developed and remote communities.

• To enhance the speech therapy service provided to students

with special educational needs. • To continue to implement inclusive education policy in line

with a whole-school approach and conduct timely review of its effectiveness to ensure appropriate use of resources.

• Special schools should be retained as they have their particular

role to play. • To continue to offer various channels of further studies and

training to persons with disabilities upon their graduation from secondary schools. Apart from higher education and vocational training, adult education (including user-pay education programmes) should also be developed.

• For students with intellectual disabilities, the education they

receive should aim at providing them with training on basic living skills and also develop their gifts and talents in sports and arts.

• To give more support in terms of teachers, curriculum design

and special arrangements in examination etc to students with specific learning difficulties or attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder.

• To incorporate the message of “a Society for All” into the

curricula of primary and secondary schools so as to facilitate the understanding and acceptance of persons with disabilities among the younger generation and nurture an inclusive culture in schools.

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• To take care of students with special educational needs, schools should discuss the needs and progress of students with their parents, seek cross-sectoral collaboration and make optimum use of resources with a view to providing students with joint support through family, school and cross-sectoral collaboration.

• Recommend the establishment of a mechanism under which

more recognition should be given to schools dedicated to inclusive education.

• The Education and Manpower Bureau should encourage

schools to draw up individualized education programmes for each of their students with special educational needs when necessary.

• Parents, teachers and students have been under enormous

pressure as support and services for students with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder at primary education stage are excessively wanting.

Vocational Training and Employment

• To enhance government departments’ and the community’s awareness and support of persons with disabilities social enterprises to facilitate the employment of persons with disabilities.

• To continue to encourage the public sector and subvented

organisations to set an indicator for employment of persons with disabilities.

• To continue to provide persons with disabilities with diversified

and market-oriented vocational training and employment services, and review the effectiveness of the services.

• To explore the feasibility of granting tax concessions to private

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firms with disabled employees as an incentive for them to employ more persons with disabilities.

• To study the idea of introducing an employment quota system

for persons with disabilities through legislation to safeguard the employment rights of persons with disabilities.

Residential Care

• To develop diversified residential services by continuing to provide subvented hostel service to those in need, assisting NGOs in developing self-financing hostels and regulating the service quality of private hostels.

• The establishment of a continuous assessment mechanism on

service users after admission should aim at identifying their changing needs of service with a view to providing them with the most suitable services. It is not for assessing whether they are fit for leaving the hostels.

Day Care, Community Support and the Development of Self-help Organisations

• To continue to strengthen the day care and community support services provided to persons with disabilities living in the community with a view to improving the quality of life of Persons with disabilities and their carers.

• To establish district coordination committees to provide district

support network for the ex-mentally ill and progressively expand the network to cover other persons with disabilities.

• To address the present uneven distribution of community

support services among different districts by beefing up such services in local districts with service gaps.

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• To facilitate the development of self-help organisations to

establish their important role in enhancing social capitals. • To assist self-help organisations in building a platform for

collaboration with various sectors of the community. Access Facilities and Transport

• To enhance public understanding and support of the provision of barrier-free access for persons with disabilities.

• To step up prosecution of against persons in breaches of the

requirements on barrier-free access and facilities.

• To explore viable options for improving the access facilities of buildings constructed before 1997.

• To conduct timely review of the Design Manual: Barrier Free

Access. • To continue to enhance Rehabus service for persons with

disabilities who are unable to use public transport. • To continue to encourage public transport operators to provide

barrier-free public transport service and facilities. • To explore the feasibility of introducing wheelchair accessible

taxi service. • To encourage public transport operators to provide

concessionary fares for persons with disabilities. • To implement the policy of “Transport for All” on an ongoing

basis.

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Use of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) and Participation in Arts, Recreational and Sports Activities

• To encourage the development of computer softwares and adaptive devices to assist persons with disabilities in using ICT.

• To continue to encourage the business sector to adopt

barrier-free webpages. • To explore ways of improving the quality of life of persons

with disabilities through the use of ICT.

• To involve representatives of persons with disabilities and people who are familiar with their needs in the consultation framework for recreational, sports and arts development.

• To direct every effort to provide barrier-free recreational, sports

and arts centres and facilities for persons with disabilities.

• To take into account “universal participation” and “individual enhancement” in promoting recreational, sports and arts development for persons with disabilities.

• To enhance the knowledge on the needs of persons with

disabilities among the staff of recreational, sports and arts centres and those involved in organising recreational, sports and arts activities, so that they are able to effectively assist persons with disabilities in using the facilities and participating in the activities.

• As many organisations nowadays provide their services through

interactive voice response system and this has caused inconvenience to people with hearing impairment, it is therefore recommended that fax and short message service (SMS) of mobile phones from hearing impaired persons be accepted.

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Public Education

• To set a clear theme for the annual public education programmes as a focal point around which government departments and NGOs could organise activities to enhance the effectiveness of the programmes.

• To urge the business sector and the media to help organise more

public education activities. • To conduct timely evaluation of the effectiveness of public

education activities so as to identify the appropriate development direction.

• To capitalise on the internet as a platform of public education.

• As one may have disabilities at different stages of life, the

message of respecting others with different levels of abilities should be conveyed by public education.